Chapter 8

"S...S...Sir!"

Her shocked scream, made the red glow in his eyes recede, and he released her. Looking closely, beside her on the ground was a fallen umbrella.

Actually, he was outside too long, too immersed in thinking of his past, that he didn't feel rain's intrusion. She came, only to share an umbrella with him, after looking for him to come home.

Looking for me to come home! Thinking up to here, he himself started to laugh at himself.

In the rain, she took in one big breath after another. Just as she was struggling to disguise the wrong she felt, the rain drenched her jeogori and chima. That moment, he had to admit that his heart was once again, shaken. Since he chose to become a monster, this is the first time that someone held an umbrella for him, and that someone worried for him. He laughed bitterly. I'm actually nostalgic for this kind of warmth. However, he couldn't be nostalgic; the past couldn't replay itself on him. He wanted, far more than this little while of warmth!

"Go back to the underground palace yourself. Don't mind me." I cannot accept her warmth, he reminded himself again. 

"Sir, it's raining hard." She tried influencing him, and with eyes revealing persistence she didn't move. She also didn't know where her stubbornness came from, but she was determined to retrieve him and return to the underground palace together. Maybe, it was because she was moved by what he had done for her in front of her father, or maybe, having been living together with him for many months, she was really standing with him. 

"Not going? Then stand there and get wet." In a huff, he expressed coldness, shook his head, and went inside a corridor in the temple. He was looking at the stubborn her from far, far away. 

As the rain got stronger, the space between her and him was like it was separated by a heavy fog, unable to see through it. 

***

Before he left, it wasn't that he didn't see the persistence in her, but that he actually was not willing to accept this, which for him, was a dangerous thing. He also had his persistence, which was that every human being was selfish, and all were prepared and willing to yield to the lust for power. Han Seong Yeon was like this, Choi Chul Joong was this, and each generation of kings were also like this. The only one who sacrificed herself for the person she loved, and the only one he'd seen, was Lee Myung Hee. 

If he and Kim Sung Yeol were enemies, then besides fighting for a one-shall-stand and one-shall-fall victory right, he also wanted to wreck, the trust that Kim Sung Yeol and Lee Myung Hee had for one another.

He has always remembered that moment when Lee Myung Hee ended her life with the knife. He was shocked by this seemingly weak woman. This destroyed his hunderds of years of persistence, but he didn't allow himself to be shaken. 

Now, facing this having-Lee-Myung-Hee's-more-and-more-alike-face Choi Hye Ryeong, he could only distant himself from her. He neeeded to see clearly where her selfishness was at, and also where her pursue for "lust" was at. 

***

"Miss. Miss?"

She doesn't know how long she stood there in the rain last night, and she also doesn't know where she was at. She only felt that, there was sunlight shinning on her! She abruptly opened her eyes, and saw a wealthy young man looking at her worriedly. 

"You're awake. Are you alright?" That man smiled. His fac